Lady Caitlyn was sitting on a sofa in the activity room, with the deputy butler, butler's assistant, and the attendant of the corresponding services seated opposite her.
She was meticulous as she gave instructions on various things to take note of for the dinner banquet that night. This continued until her daughter, Audrey, came to her side.
"Mother, I have something to tell you." Audrey swept her gaze across the other people in the room.
On the way to the activity room, she had felt a slight tremor, but she didn't discover anything unusual.
Lady Caitlyn looked around and nodded.
"All of you can return later."
The activity room turned silent very quickly and even Susie was signaled by Audrey to leave.
"You should stay by my side more often and learn how to handle matters. Although you don't lack such content in your family lessons, it's still profound knowledge on how to effectively combine theory with practice," Lady Caitlyn, who looked to be in her early thirties despite being in her fifties, smiled and educated her daughter. "Alright, my little angel, what is it?"
Audrey tried to produce the elegant smile she'd practiced in etiquette class, but she found herself with a heavy, nervous smile.
She pursed her dry lips and directly said, "Mother, I've been hiding something from you and Father."
"Oh?" Lady Caitlyn tilted her head, waiting for a further explanation.
Audrey's words were a little staccato at first, but then they immediately became smooth and fluent.
"I... I'm already a Beyonder, the kind of person who possesses miraculous powers by consuming a potion."
The blonde Lady Caitlyn raised her eyebrows lightly and answered without any hint of surprise, "I know.
"Both your father and I know about it."
"Huh?" Audrey was momentarily at a loss as to how to continue.
Lady Caitlyn covered her mouth and laughed.
"You took so many mystical ingredients from the vault, and you are so naive to think that your father and I didn't notice?
"By your father's side, in this villa, and in the fief of our family, there's no lack of Beyonders. They may be a result of a simple employment relationship, or they may have been assigned by the Church of the Goddess, or they may have been members of the Hall family. His Majesty has tacitly agreed to such matters, and we have also tacitly consented to your little adventures... Sigh, you will eventually grow up and mature. Your father and I will never be able to protect you under our wings forever. You will have to face certain matters alone, so having additional powers to aid you as a trump card is good too.
"Yes, according to the general knowledge that I'm aware of, the initial stages shouldn't be that dangerous, and advancing will require one to two years, or maybe even three years. So, your father and I aren't too anxious, and we intended to wait until you become an adult to give you a word of warning so that you can stop at your present state."
No, Mother, your general knowledge is wrong. You don't know the acting method. If I have all the ingredients, then I can become a Sequence 7 Psychiatrist before the new year... Moreover, I do not wish to stop. The death of Duke Negan has made me understand that the world isn't as stable and peaceful as I thought it was. I want to have the power to protect all of you at critical moments...
Mr. Fool is gradually recovering, and evil gods are making repeated attempts to descend. Although I'm still immature and lack the necessary knowledge, I can sense the hidden, indescribable dangers from these matters... Audrey had always known that she couldn't avoid the problem of taking Beyonder ingredients from the vault, but she thought that perhaps by chance, her parents weren't aware of the specific effects of those items. At most, they would suspect that she was getting deeper and deeper into her mysticism enthusiast circle.
After releasing the burden in her heart, she paid no notice to her mother's exhortation and said, "Mother, I later joined a secret organization, one that's more academic and doesn't worship evil gods. Please forgive me for not being able to say its name and details, but I've already made an oath."
Without waiting for her mother to ask, she cut to the chase.
"I received word today that the commoner girl who Prince Edessak has fallen in love with is a Demoness. I don't know what kind of plot they are plotting."
The first two sentences of hers didn't contain any absolute connection. The former referred to the Psychology Alchemists, while the source of the latter was the Tarot Club, which was Mr. Fool.
Through this arrangement of sentences, every word she said was true, one that could be confirmed through divination. However, it would make people believe that her news came from the secret organization known as the Psychology Alchemists.
The smile on Caitlyn's face gradually disappeared as she solemnly asked, "Demoness?"
She didn't know much about the mysterious world, but the very word was enough to make her sense the evil and become uneasy.
Audrey quickly nodded.
"Yes, a Demoness of Pleasure.
"And what scares me even more is that her name is Trissy Cheek."
"What's wrong with that?" her mother asked, puzzled.
"A member of that organization has seen the name Cheek in an ancient book," Audrey said the lie that she had already planned for. Whether it was her tone, her words, the details of her expression, or her body language, they were all flawless. "In the Fourth Epoch or earlier, it's a name that belonged to the Primordial Demoness."
Immediately after, she gravely added, "That's an evil goddess!"
Lady Caitlyn didn't understand what the Primordial Demoness meant, but she knew exactly what an evil goddess meant.
She couldn't sit still any longer and quickly replied with a question, "Are you sure?"
"... I'm not sure." Audrey didn't doubt Mr. Fool at all, but she couldn't say so openly. "No matter what, I think it's necessary to seek the royal family, no—get the Beyonders of the Church of the Goddess to confirm the matter. If it involves an evil goddess, it's always the right decision to be cautious."
Caitlyn looked up at her daughter in surprise.
"... Audrey, you've grown up."
If it weren't for the urgency of the matter, Audrey would've pretended to be reserved upon hearing such praise. She would first modestly wheedle, then return to her room in glee. She might even twirl into a dance.
But now, she couldn't care about that at all. She quickly let her worry and nervousness surface on her expression.
"Mother, can you help me hide the truth? I heard that the Beyonders of the Church and the royal family abhor secret organizations that aren't a part of them. Well, you can say that it was news which Father received. He should have plenty of channels for information."
Caitlyn stood up and gave her daughter a hug.
"Don't worry, neither your father nor I will involve you in this.
"Your father won't be back until evening. I'll first let the hidden guards appear, pretend that he sent a message, then I'll get the Church of the Goddess to send Beyonders to protect our family."
"Alright!" Audrey replied happily.
At that moment, she finally breathed a sigh of relief. She was exhausted from maintaining her prolonged high level of tension.
...
Looking at the few burning meteors crashing down at a high speed and enveloping the whole forest, Klein actually had the thought of waiting helplessly for his doom in despair.
Even if he continuously used Flaming Jump, it would be impossible for him to escape the forest and the dangerous epicenter before the meteor shower landed. Moreover, the weak body of a Beyonder from the Seer pathway didn't allow the possibility of him withstanding a head-on meteor strike.
Even a zombie that wouldn't be wounded by a revolver would immediately be turned into minced meat under such an "attack." Moreover, it would become charred black... Flaming Jump... The yellow-white light shone into the depths of his eyes, quickly giving Klein, who had not given up, an idea.
In a situation that was depicted in seconds, he didn't hesitate. He did whatever that came to his mind.
Pa!
After silently calculating the distance, Klein snapped his fingers and ignited all the remaining matches in the matchbox.
A streak of crimson red light soared into the sky, quickly enveloping his figure within it.
Klein disappeared without a sound, appearing in the flames above the meteor.
Whoosh!
The meteor rapidly descended. The moment he leaped out of the flames, he was away from the meteor's vicinity, entering a region of air with frighteningly high temperatures.
At the moment when he used his Beyonder powers to jump, Klein was immune to ordinary flames even if the temperature was rather high. However, upon exiting that state, he had to do his best to avoid the flames via Flame Controlling. Otherwise, he would suffer burn wounds and even burn to death.
In addition, the hot air wasn't within his "jump" range.
Pa!
Klein snapped his fingers again, causing the air at a critical point to ignite.
He phased into another flame, trying to avoid the first blast upon the meteorite's impact.
However, no matter how many times he tried and how many risks he took, he still couldn't escape the danger. There were only two choices: to jump to a point away from the forest and suffer the meteorite's resulting blast, or to jump around like an acrobatic, waiting for the mushroom cloud to swallow him up.
For a moment, Klein thought he could see himself being torn apart, scorched black with flames still burning over his body.
A thought flashed through his mind, and his vision suddenly changed as all the colors saturated. The reds became redder, the yellows become yellower, and the whites became whiter, just like a strange oil painting!
The "oil painting" seemed to be different from the real world, allowing Klein to watch as the meteorite "slowly" crashed to the ground.
That patch of the forest was instantly destroyed, and the ground clearly quaked a few times. Plumes of smoke that were mixed with flames rose up, forming a strange mushroom cloud.
Such an impact didn't affect Klein, because the blast simply didn't enter the superposed, still "oil-painting world."
Klein was stunned at first before he saw the human figure next to him.
The figure had bronze skin with a medium build. He wore a long black suit and a half top hat. He had a pair of aged brown eyes, soft facial features, and a tiny mole below his right ear.
"Mr. Azik!" Klein cried out in joy.
He finally knew what scene the revelation from the divination he made a long time ago corresponded to.
It corresponded to the present!
The sea of blood represented a perilous situation, and being pulled up by Mr. Azik meant being rescued because of him!
Just as Klein's words left his mouth, Azik waved his hand, grabbed his arm, and pushed his way through the deep layers of saturated colors!
...
The ordinary-looking quill was no longer writing on its own, and its surface had dimmed a little.
The solemn-looking middle-aged man with only one eye grabbed it and quickly wrote as if he was channeling a spirit.
"It was obvious that Azik Eggers had yet to recover all his memories and strength. While attempting to travel through the spirit world and the astral world, a latent danger appeared as a result of this problem. Hence, he and Sherlock Moriarty found themselves landing near Ince Zangwill and his friend."
